Gumroad and Shelf both let you sell ebooks, templates and other digital products from a page of your own. They charge in opposite ways: Gumroad takes a cut of every sale, and Shelf charges a monthly price and takes 0% on digital products. For buyers in Portugal, there is also MB WAY.
The short version
- Buyers in Portugal, steady sales: Shelf. MB WAY at checkout, and €19.35 of every €19.90 ebook.
- Buyers worldwide in English, few sales, no VAT work: Gumroad. No monthly price, and it handles VAT.
Side by side
| Shelf | Gumroad | |
|---|---|---|
| Fee per sale | 0% on digital products, courses and sessions (5% on communities) + Stripe (1.5% + €0.25 with MB WAY) | 10% + $0.50 + card processing; 30% on Discover sales |
| Monthly price | €29/month or €99/year | None |
| MB WAY | Yes, every product | Not listed |
| VAT on digital sales | Yours (you are the seller) | Handled for you |
| Marketplace | No | Discover |
| Checked | Shelf's code, 8 Nov 2026 | gumroad.com/pricing, 8 Nov 2026 |
What you keep on a €19.90 ebook
On Shelf you pay Stripe's 1.5% + €0.25 (€0.55) and keep €19.35. On Gumroad, 10% + $0.50 plus processing comes to about €3.28, and you keep about €16.62 (euro figures with the ECB rate of 13 Oct 2026).
That €2.73 difference pays Shelf's monthly price from about 11 sales a month on the monthly plan, and from 4 on the yearly one.
When Gumroad is the better choice
- You sell in English to buyers around the world, and VAT handled for you matters more than the fee.
- You sell a few times a month, so a monthly price would cost more than the cut.
- You want the chance of being found on Discover, at 30% on those sales.
When Shelf is the better choice
- Your buyers are in Portugal and pay with MB WAY on their phones.
- You sell often enough that 0% beats 10% + $0.50 (see the sums above).
- You also want courses, paid sessions with Google Calendar and Meet, or a paid community, on the same page.
- Who Shelf is for: creators based in Portugal. Your Stripe account opens in Portugal, and the app is in Portuguese.
